Sunshine Review

Sunshine Review is "a non-profit organization dedicated to state and local government transparency," according to the organization website. Upon its launch in 2008, it was a project of the Sam Adams Alliance, but "in 2010 separated from SAM and launched its own organization dedicated to educating the public about affirmative disclosure and other open government initiatives." The organization works with the National Taxpayers Union (which is funded by Philip Morris) "to develop information on state spending" and the Madison-based Lucy Burns Institute, which "runs the WikiFOIA project" as well as BallotPedia.

The organization defines "government transparency" or "open government" as "the political doctrine which holds that the business of government and state administration should be opened at all levels to effective public scrutiny and oversight. In its broadest construction it opposes reason of state and national security considerations, which have tended to legitimize extensive state secrecy." The organization runs a wiki that "collects and shares transparency information and uses a '10-point Transparency Checklist'"-- defined as "a list of website transparency features that citizens in any part of the United States should be able to find when they visit the websites of counties, cities, school districts, and state agencies"-- "to evaluate the content of every state and more than 5,000 local government websites." This is called the "My Government Review" Project. The organization propounds the belief "that the responsibility of providing information falls on the government, who should participate in affirmative disclosure"-- defined as "the revelation of information that may be damaging to the one revealing it. When used in the terms of open government, it is the practice of the government publishing government data, rather than for an individual's public records request."

When considered in relation to the Financial Stress Test model as applied to municipal, county and state governments, one may wonder, as Rick Ungar does in an op-ed for Forbes April 20, 2011, if, "by making information more transparent by placing complicated financial data online that is already provided to the Department of Revenue..., the residents of local communities will somehow gain a better understanding as to how good or bad things are in their home town." (His comments are in relation to a Greater Milwaukee Committee proposal for the "development of a fiscal stress test for Wisconsin municipalities".)

Non-members who attempt to edit the Sunshine Review wiki pages receive a warning message that reads "Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be recorded in this page's edit history" but are apparently not prevented from making changes.

Changes Effected
In January of 2009, St. Charles Parish, LA unveiled a new website containing more information, "partly in response to a review of the parish's old Web site by the Sunshine Review," including adding "the parish's budget, audit and other financial information to the site," at a cost of $47,000.

In December of 2008, DuPage County, IL promised to add information about county contracts to its newly redesigned website in response to a mostly-positive rating (eight categories out of ten already meeting standards) from the Sunshine Review.

Tulsa County, OK, Owasso City, OK, Anderson County, SC and Cook County, IL have also made changes to their websites in response to Sunshine Review ratings.

Wisconson
In April 2011, a press release penned by Claire Milbrandt, an Account Manager at J Connors and Co public relations firm in Milwaukee (whose office is in the same building as an Americans for Prosperity office, according to a Google Maps search) and former consultant at Americans for Prosperity, revealed that "Wisconsin school districts earned an overall "D" transparency grade for information available on their websites according to an analysis conducted by Sunshine Review, a pro-transparency group.

"Of the 442 school districts rated by the group, 173 earned failing grades.... Organizations across Wisconsin like Wisconsin Policy Research Institute (WPRI) have been pushing transparency for years without much success from Madison.... Madison’s school district, one of the largest in the state, garnered only a C- due to only partially meeting many of the requirements.

"The President of Sunshine Review, Michael Barnhart, believes if schools begin to proactively disclose the other checklist components it will have a positive impact on the state’s education system. 'It is crucial for parents and taxpayers to have access to complete information about how school districts operate,' said Barnhart."

Public Discourse
Sunshine Review sponsors a weekly chat on Twitter via @FOIAchat that has hosted journalists like Pulitzer winner Ryan Gabrielson.

Personnel
Michael Barnhart, Executive Director (also on the board of the Sam Adams Alliance) Kristin McMurray, Senior Editor, formerly of the Sam Adams Alliance Joshua Meyer, WikiFOIA Editor (WikiFOIA is a project of the Lucy Burns Institute, which links to Sunshine Review from its homepage)

Although an organization dedicated to transparency, Sunshine Review lists no Board members nor any information about its funding on its website.

Contact Details
No physical address is listed on the organization website. Tel: (773) 234-9812 Email: Kristinpedia@sunshinereview.org Website: http://sunshinereview.org/core/home

Related SourceWatch Articles
Sam Adams Alliance National Taxpayers Union

External Resources
[category:Conservatives]]